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Abstract:

A method of billing or charging a receiver for a mobile communication
being message, that allows the receiver to receive messages as part of a
service, the receiver being billed directly by the telecommunications
carrier who then in turn aggregates a revenue share based on messages
sent to receivers, who then in turn pay a percentage of the revenue share
to the premium SMS aggregator. The receiver can be of a selected status,
which is set to a pre-selected schedule and can receive messages without
charge or with a charge. This enables the payment system to be simple and
efficient.

Claims:

1. A method of billing or charging a receiver for a mobile communication
being a message, the method including the steps of: a receiver electing
to receive a message from a telecommunications carrier; an at least one
first party collating information on a subject and constructing a message
based on the collated information, the first party having a credit pool;
determining a status of the credit pool of the first party; determining
the status of the receiver according to pre-set schedule; adding or
subtracting a credit to the credit pool in accordance to the status of
the receiver the first party forwarding the message to a premium SMS
aggregator to aggregate messages; the premium SMS aggregator submitting
aggregated messages to a telecommunications carrier; forwarding of the
messages to the receiver by the telecommunications carriers network; the
telecommunications carrier registering a charge against the receiver of
the messages in relation to a pre-set scale; the receiver paying the
charge direct to the telecommunications carrier; the telecommunications
carrier aggregates a revenue share based on messages sent to receivers;
and paying a percentage of the revenue share to the premium SMS
aggregator.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the collated information is attendance
data.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the receiver elects to receive a
message from a telecommunications carrier by pre-registering with the
information provider.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein message is an SMS.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the information provider compiles the
collated information into a SMS message prior to forwarding to premium
SMS aggregator.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the pre-set schedule is a database
containing receivers details the receivers details including a charge
discount, said discount being applied to registered charge.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the receiver's details include a
charging status.

Description:

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

[0001] The present invention relates to a method of telecommunications
billing and in particular to a method of billing a calling party without
charging an information provider.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PRIOR ART

[0002] Mobile communication companies supply many services to end users or
customer. Some of these services are provided by the short message
service (SMS) or multimedia message services (MMS), both of which are
recognised industry standard communication protocols.

[0003] SMS in particular has shown to be a useful method of communicating
small messages to users, at their request, in a relatively easy manner.
SMS has grown in acceptance amongst the majority of mobile
telecommunications users, whereby many users use SMS on a regular basis
to obtain information on various subjects. This is often referred to as
"premium charged content" as opposes to simple "peer-to-peer" content.

[0004] An example of "premium charged content" is where a user subscribes,
or "opts in" to a news service provided by a telecommunications service
provider; these are commonly referred to as "alerts". For example, the
BBC provide a BBC news SMS alerts service where a user sends a SMS to a
number designated by the telecommunications network to subscribe then the
BBC, via the telecommunications service provider send news alerts to the
subscriber at a preset fee, typically $0.20 -$0.30 per message, which is
paid direct to the telecommunications service provider. In this instance,
the news service provider, the BBC, is a third-party value added service
provider (VASP) or content provider.

[0005] The telecommunications service provider also charge the BBC, or
other information service provider, for providing a conduit for the
transmission of the SMS alerts to the end user.

[0006] However, this method of charging both the information service
provider (VASP) and the end user does not facilitate the provision of
information that has a low frequency of sent messages or acts as a
barrier to market for the provision of information that may be of a very
specific nature where each message sent may be of value and relevancy to
a specific intended receiver and not to a general audience.

[0007] Such information may be information relating to the attendance or
non-attendance of an individual at a school or institution. Such
information on attendance or non-attendance is of a very specific nature
and not intended for a general audience, such as a SMS on news headlines,
for example.

[0008] The costs incurred by the school or institution in firstly setting
up an attendance information system that enable the school or institution
to provide such attendance information to intended users can be
considered to be a barrier to providing such a service. Additionally,
without the attendance information from the school or institution then a
VASP is discouraged from providing some information services due to the
high costs of setting up the service.

OBJECT OF THE INVENTION

[0009] It is an object of the present invention to provide a method of
billing a mobile subscriber for information services without charging the
information provider.

[0010] Other objects and advantages of the present invention will become
apparent from the following description, taking in connection with the
accompanying drawings, wherein, by way of illustration and example, an
embodiment of the present invention is disclosed.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

[0011] According to the present invention, although this should not be
seen as limiting the invention in any way, there is provided a method of
billing or charging a receiver for a mobile communication being message,
the method including the steps of:

[0012] a receiver electing to receive a message from a telecommunications
carrier;

[0013] an at least one first party collating information on a subject and
constructing a message based on the collated information, the first party
having a credit pool;

[0014] determining a status of the credit pool of the first party;

[0015] determining the status of the receiver according to pre-set
schedule;

[0016] adding or subtracting a credit to the credit pool in accordance to
the status of the receiver

[0017] the first party forwarding the message to a premium SMS aggregator
to aggregate messages;

[0019] forwarding of the messages to the receiver by the
telecommunications carriers network;

[0020] the telecommunications carrier registering a charge against the
receiver of the messages in relation to a pre-set scale;

[0021] the receiver paying the charge direct to the telecommunications
carrier;

[0022] the telecommunications carrier aggregates a revenue share based on
messages sent to receivers; and

[0023] paying a percentage of the revenue share to the premium SMS
aggregator.

[0024] In preference, the collated information is attendance data.

[0025] In preference, the receiver elects to receive a message from a
telecommunications carrier by pre-registering with the information
provider.

[0026] In preference, message is an SMS.

[0027] In preference, the information provider compiles the collated
information into a SMS message prior to forwarding to premium SMS
aggregator.

[0028] In preference, the pre-set schedule is a database containing
receivers details the receivers details including a charge discount, said
discount being applied to registered charge.

[0029] In preference the receiver's details include a charging status.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0030] A school, or other institution in which attendance data is
recorded, collects information relating to attendance of students or
other personnel and enters this information into a student information
system. The student information system is provided to the school by a
service provider such as [MGM] and the school then collates the
attendance data and constructs an attendance message containing
attendance information in a form that matches individual attendance of a
person with an intended recipient.

[0031] The intended recipient is a person who has requested or has opt-in
to receive messages on the attendance or non-attendance of a particular
individual from the school or institutions and provides a mobile
telephone number on which they would like to receive attendance
information. For example, the recipient may be a parent of a child at
school, where the parent has a desire to be made aware of the attendance
or non-attendance of the child at the school.

[0032] In addition to the attendance information, the information may be
in relation to specific events deemed by the school or institution as
being appropriate to send to the intended recipient and may include
information such as sporting events, event location changes, security
information, health information etc.

[0033] Once the attendance message has been compiled at the school via the
student information system, this compiled attendance message, containing
all the attendance information, is processed into a message suitable for
sending via SMS and is forwarded to a processing centre to check for data
accuracy and integrity and then subsequently sent to a SMS aggregator.

[0034] The SMS aggregator then forwards the specific attendance messages
to a telecommunications carrier in the form of a SMS, the
telecommunications carrier in turn forwards the SMS to the intended
recipient's numbers as requested in the specific attendance message.

[0035] The details of the intended receiver also includes details
regarding the receivers status, in particular their status in regards to
charging (charging status). Some intended receivers will be registered as
being able to receive all messages at no cost, if their economic status,
as determined by the institution or a particular government body for
example, has indicated that they are not capable of paying for such a
service.

[0036] Other intended recipients may be determined as being capable for
paying for all services/messages and are therefore allocated a separate
status. All messages then sent to such intended recipients will incur
full pro-rata costs.

[0037] For example, the parent of a child at school may be allocated as to
belong to one of four categorie:

[0038] Approved patent/caregiver;

[0039] Casual parent/caregiver;

[0040] School Nominated parent-caregiver; or

[0041] Non-financial parent/caregiver.

[0042] In order for a school to send messages using the system it must be
in credit in a credit pool (SMS credit). Each time a message is sent to
an intended receiver the system, such as the SMS aggregator determines
the status of the schools credit pool and upon confirming that sufficient
SMS credits exist then credits or debits the SMS pool based on the
"parent type" in accordance with, for example, the following table:

[0043] By having such a status linked to the intended recipients details
its now possible to create various status levels in-between full charge
and no-charge status's so as to accommodate various other levels of
economic status as reflected by the needs of the system and the
requirements of the particular institution.

[0044] Once the intended receiver has been sent the message the system
then levies a charge against the intended recipient in accordance with
their charging status.

[0045] The intended recipient then receives the specific attendance
message from the telecommunications carrier and subsequently receive a
bill for the message in their phone bill. Upon payment of the bill from
the telecommunications carrier, the telecommunications carrier then
collates the SMS aggregators revenue share, based on a percentage of
charge or at a fixed rate or some other formula and then forwards the SMS
aggregators revenue share to the SMS aggregator.

[0046] Alternatively, but still within the scope of the invention, the
intended recipient may pay a fixed monthly charge (or other time period
subscription that, for example, may coincide with the enrollment of the
child at school) in relation to receiving such messages, entitling the
intended recipient to receive as many messages at no additional per
message charge.

[0047] Upon receipt of the SMS aggregators revenue share by the SMS
aggregator, the SMS aggregator then forwards a revenue share to
the(service provider [MGM] based on a percentage of charge or at a fixed
rate or some other formula.

[0048] In this way, as now is apparent, the school does not incur a cost
in relation the sending of the attendance information to the intended
recipient rather it is the intended recipient that, by opting in to
receive attendance information of a particular individual agrees to be
invoiced charges for receipt of that information. This differs markedly
from the way in which present VASP's operate in that there is first of
all a charge associated with the collection of information and subsequent
charges for the distribution of the information.

[0049] Although the invention has been herein shown and described in what
is conceived to be the most practical and preferred embodiment, it is
recognized that departures can be made within the scope of the invention,
which is not to be limited to the details described herein.